Well, for some weird reason, I feel compelled to read books involving a Piper. Sometimes, the Piper is the author, such as H. Beam Piper or Harold Piper (generally known as Hal), and sometimes there's a Piper in the title, such as Uncle Piper of Piper's Hill or this particular work of science fiction.

This was a mildly interesting science-fiction story. It seems that there is a problem on an asteroid, Y-3, where there is a base employed to check incoming spacecraft for germs, viruses and such noxious things. Well, the people on the asteroid have begun to stop working. They just spend their days lying out in the sun. They claim to have become plants. The Pipers in the woods have trained them to become plants. They can now do nothing else. Dr. Henry Harris is dispatched to investigate. It was a fun enough story and not overly long.

I was worried about his notice at the end of the book, but I'd read it all, and I had things to say. 

 

You can read the author's response here.

 

You do have to scroll down a bit, but, yeah, he took no issue with me pointing out some editing errors.   Given the fact that I liked the ideas, and the editing errors weren't horrendous or too numerous*, and given his response here, I would read more by him in a heartbeat.   Yay!

 

*If they had been, I wouldn't be eager to read more.

So, good idea, good general execution.   Bad editing. 

 

So let's get the good out of the way: it was a thoughtful story with a twist at the end that I simply did not see.   That author played this straight throughout, so it was a pretty big shock.   The narrative ploys were all incredibly well done. 

 

And then there was the grammar. 

 

"He had not seen much of anything useful than some twisted metal when he noticed a large silver crate, clearly battered by the elements, but nonetheless still intact."

 

Missing word. 

 

"These infernal brains of mine, why won't it let me know my past?"

 

Brain/it and brains/them.   But there is a definite issue here. 

 

"'Sort of like the other day when you thought those shadows and trees was a monster?'"

 

Were, not was.   There's a repeated pattern here, where the tenses and numbers of things don't match up. 

 

".)."

 

Choose where the period goes.   Use one per sentence, please. 

 

And I'm kinda freaked out about this review.   He's asking for Amazon reviews, but says this: 

 

"Your feedback is very important to me; I read every review."

 

 

It was mostly the mechanics of the writing that tripped me up; this felt like an amateur attempt, and as that?   It was decent.   The writing itself was legible, and grammar fine enough, but the dialogue felt stilted and there was more telling than there should have been. 

 

The idea behind it, though?  I did like how the author played with the server-robots, and how they couldn't lie to humans, and how they struggled with that.   How they struggled with if they were alive, or simply functioning.   There were a lot of really heavy ideas that are really ripe for further exploration here.   But this is one of the problems.   In a twenty page short story?   They weren't fully explored, especially given the writing level.   

 

Still, this is exciting.   I feel confident that this author will become more adept at dialogue, and showing.   If that's the case, then this story shows a lot of promise, and what he might write in the future?   Exciting.   Worth the read to say, 'ah, I read it back when...'

39 books in January.   I'm a little bit behind on my 500 book reading goal, though.   

 

Favorite books?  Robot Pony, World After, Miller's Robocop, Backup, Dating After Dark, The Day the Robots Woke Up, and Bot! Combo Pack.   

 

Disappointments?   Transformers Retribution, Serial Killer's Guide, and, yeah, the Robocop novelization.   

 

Overall, though, pretty good month.   I'm only like ten books behind, and I had a lot of fun reading a majority of the books.   

 

By the way, is this something you guys are interested in?   I don't wanna bug y'all, but if you like the monthly wrap up, let me know.  I'll continue!   (I saw one or two other people do this, and figured I'd put my own spin on my wrap up, just doing the count/highlights/letdowns.)